Adoption Of Four Handicapped Boys On Agenda For Foster Mother

This is Foster Care Month, a time to salute the thousands of foster parents throughout the country who give of themselves in caring for other people's children.

Linda Williams of Newport News is one of those very special mothers, who has raised her own two children and helped care for 23 foster children. She and her husband will soon adopt four of these youngsters.

"I try to make the foster children feel like they have two mothers, their natural mothers and me. It seems to work, because they call me Mom."

Williams has taken her devotion to the young of the nation one step further by starting adoption procedures for four little boys, each of whom is handicapped.

"I believe the children are our future and this is my way of contributing to that future," says Williams, who has been involved in the Newport News Social Services Department's foster parent program for the past 13 years.

"I thought about it a lot before becoming involved in the foster care program, but if I can be the means of salvaging one little child by showing him there is someone who cares I'll be happy."

Williams' husband, Anthony, who is a machinist with a Norfolk firm, has given wholehearted support to her child care efforts. Her natural children, Jerrie, 22, and Toni, 16, pitch in to help, often help in baby-sitting when their mother has errands to run or when their parents take a short weekend vacation.

"I'm quite proud of my daughters. These are extra special people," she says, noting that Jerrie is a civil service employee anad Toni is a junior and member of the National Honor Society at Warwick High School.

Williams was born in Portsmouth and moved to the Peninsula with her husband of 16 years after he got out of the Navy and went to work at Newport News Shipbuilding. "We wanted to start fresh and make new friends in a new area," she says. "When he went to work in Norfolk, we decided to stay right here. This is our home now."

"He is from Midland, Pa. We met in Norfolk years ago when he was assigned to the USS Hermitage."

Williams worked as a bank teller for a number of years until she decided to become involved in foster care.

She is a strong advocate of the program and actively campaigns to get other families involved in looking out for children, who have become wards of the city until the court decides where to place them.

"We have been an emergency home for 23 children until the four boys came along. Most of the children stay a few months or a year, but we want the boys with us forever. That's why we want to adopt." she says.

"Three of the boys, ages 7,8, and 9, came to our home when they were around 2 years old. This is the only home they've known. The youngest, now 4 years old, came to live with us when he was a tiny infant."

The boys are now in school, including the youngest who began Head Start classes this year.

The children's handicaps are varied. One has bilateral cleft palate and is still in the process of a series of operations to help correct the disfigurement. Another child has Down's syndrome; while the remaining two have attention deficit hypoactive disorders. The children, whom Williams declined to identify by name until after the adoption, also have learning disabilities.

"They are all special needs kids, with some mental, emotional or physical problem, but that doesn't matter. The boys are settled with us and we are settled with them. We want to keep them forever. This is all the home they've known."

"Originially, I didn't want babies, but small children, preferrably girls, to be companions to my daughters. As time passed, we ended up with babies and boys. We've never regretted it."